Bill Mutranowski, "You Bloggin' to Me? How the Self Illusion Trolls Us and Why Skeptics Should Care"

Neuroscience and reason are telling us that we're not the freely choosing, self-directed people we suppose. That revelation isn't exactly headline news in a country steeped in religious faith, superstition, and pseudoscience. But even among skeptical Americans-self-professed critical thinkers and advocates for secular values and scientific literacy-assumptions about the self and free will seem as entrenched as ever. ...Neuroscience and reason are telling us that we're not the freely choosing, self-directed people we suppose. That revelation isn't exactly headline news in a country steeped in religious faith, superstition, and pseudoscience. But even among skeptical Americans-self-professed critical thinkers and advocates for secular values and scientific literacy-assumptions about the self and free will seem as entrenched as ever.This book contends that the efforts of skeptics to change society at large are impeded by our attachment to outmoded notions about the self and volition-we take things way too personally and give too little consideration to individual circumstances. But there's hope. Becoming more objective about our self-engendered impulses can make us more empathetic, compassionate, and wise, enhancing our effectiveness as a movement.With humor, and by highlighting basic neuroscientific, philosophical, and psychological insights, the essay-length ebook You Bloggin' to Me? hopes to plant the seeds of self-doubt in the brain of every skeptic, atheist, and freethinker in America. Ultimately, though, its purpose is not to disturb, but rather to demonstrate that we're all burdened by deep prejudices we harbor about the self.